Everyday Experience And/As Art

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We walk to work on our tiptoes. We self-police our facial expressions, smiling enough to ingratiate but not so much as to risk not being taken seriously. We make sure that our voices are not too “shrill,” that we do not laugh too much. We read articles cautioning us not to show weakness by apologizing, although we know that doing so is a way to accommodate our coworkers when they feel threatened by our expertise. Even when there is nothing to apologize for, we say “sorry,” as if we regret our very presence in the workplace. And for good reason: the truth is that we are unwelcome.

I’ve been haunted the last couple of days by the image of Donald Trump looming over Hillary Clinton in the second presidential debate. This has been described as “creeping,” “lurking,” and “stalking,” and Trump has even been called a “walking trigger alert.” As the debate took place, some viewers took to social media to express their fear that Trump might physically attack Clinton during the proceedings.

Add to this the din of the Republican politicians who are suddenly shocked—just shocked!—at the indignity of women’s genitalia being spoken about in vulgar terms, which interferes with their right to conceive of us as their hypothetical and wholesome “wives, daughters, and sisters.” We are construed as extensions of them, not as speaking subjects with a right to have sex as well as to say no. The righteous want to “champion and revere” our genitals, as long as we ask their permission before seeking out the medical care those genitals need.

This messy mix of public and private pussy-mongering played itself out on the stage on Sunday evening. Given Trump’s own habit of treating his business as entertainment, it’s tempting to see his antics as more a personal tic or a boorish embarrassment than as an obstruction of women’s professional activity. That his own “business” has required women to wear evening gowns in the “office” further blurs the line between blithe recreation and self-regulation. But as hard as it may be to remember that Access Hollywood is a workplace, we do well to remember that what happens on the bus does not stay on the bus. Indeed, one does not have to work for Access Hollywood or in reality television to encounter aggressive, discriminatory coworkers who seem to think, “I can do whatever I want.”

Back to the image of Trump hovering behind Clinton: of course, he is seeking dominance by aiming to control the physical space, flaunting his physical size, disrupting and distracting from the business at hand. But what is the nature of the disruption and distraction?

Viewed just a few days after the abhorrent video was released, Trump’s belligerent pouting and intrusive pacing have a particular flavor. His refusal to take the proceedings seriously recalls the way some treat the workplace as a playground. We had just seen and heard that video, with Trump revealing to another man, in private, what sorts of things he thinks women are. Appropriately, the video does not show him talking about “legs” and “tits” and “pussy,” but the video allows (forces?) us to hold a glass to the wall and witness the disgusting—a word Trump used to describe breast-feeding!—words. Only the exterior of the bus, the “wall” keeping us separate, is in view. When Trump and Bush exit the bus, we not only see the men who have been bantering, but we take in their somewhat more public personae: still creepy, to be sure, but with a thin veneer of cordiality over their grabbiness, pretending to their mark that they believe she is something other than a thing.

It’s telling how many headlines purport to reveal “the most disturbing aspect” of this video. And they are all correct. Indeed, as I write this commentary, I run across an article that acknowledges the discomfiting shift from private to public in the video.

Maybe Zucker thinks that she is in on the joke. But really, we know, the power is all theirs. It is not just that the two men have erased her as a person, during their conversation on the bus; it is that they share the knowledge that they have done so, silently, collectively, which amplifies their power over her. It is all unspoken, a clubby secret, a male form of control based on exclusion.

Hearing the men within the bus and then seeing how they behave when they disembark is unsettling; it makes one wonder what might be going on behind closed doors, not only on the Bushy Bus festooned with the word “access,” but in the conference room when one is home sick. (And again, we see a woman at work in clothing designed to be worn out dancing. No wonder Donald gets confused about how to behave!)

How often do we act in good faith, presenting ourselves professionally and responsibly, even as colleagues and professional contacts carry on entirely different conversations just out of earshot? Are such conversations about our legs, or about saddling us with legwork? Are they about “grabbing pussy” or grabbing credit for our research? Are they about being a “star” and thus able to get away with sticking one’s mouth on a woman without permission, or about putting words in her mouth, projecting one’s own unaddresssed psychological issues onto her in an email about tax regulations or expenses reports or copyright? What sort of joke is it?

Trump looms over Hillary Clinton on stage. He paces and lurks like a pre-verbal ancestor lacking opposable thumbs. The differential in the candidates’ physical statures eerily reinforces the unequal statuses men and women experience in the workplace and elsewhere. (Just imagine if Clinton were to hover behind him making faces. This would never happen.)

It’s an Orwellian spectacle: a man interrupts a woman yet again, then, when corrected on it, boorishly disparages her by claiming that he interrupted what she was saying “because she’s got nothing to say.”

It’s not only his efforts to monopolize the physical space, and not only his flaunting of his size and his gender dominance. There is also that pout, the sticking out of the lower jaw. Are there Tic Tacs jostling about in that cavity, “just in case” a hottie in the audience asks him about carried interest and he cannot stop himself from slobbering all over her face? Trump uses his entire body to interfere with his opponent’s right to do her job, but I cannot help but focus on that mouth: the source of those abhorrent words, the instrument of interference, the untamed yapper that keeps trying to shut the woman up.

Having “not seen” Trump demean a woman in private (albeit in a corporate vehicle), only to meet her and pretend to treat her like a human being, I shudder to imagine what this thug, right here on stage, in this debate, might be saying silently. He is not behind closed doors now, but he is behind her, creating a male-only space we, but not she, can see. It’s like the workplace equivalent of cuckold ears (fancy that), or as if he placed a whoopee cushion on her seat. His inane showboating reminds us that she is acting too. If she is prepared, if she exercises self-control, perhaps “she’s not really” who she claims to be (although I for one want a president capable of self-aware behavior, not one who “tells it like it is” in lie after lie). Trump’s interference in Clinton’s presentation breaks the spell and even mocks our belief in the performance. He invites us to ridicule her for daring to assume such a role. She listens to others, takes their questions seriously, responds in complete sentences with enthusiasm and expertise—all with a man behind her silently boasting, “I can do whatever I want. She’s really an it. How silly of her to think we would listen to what she is saying!”

The fact that Clinton looms over him in qualifications, maturity, responsibility, impulse control, and even command of the English language, jars in the face of this display of male dominance and aggression. Watching the reality “star” mugging behind the former Senator and erstwhile Secretary of State eerily reminds us of the ways men are empowered to exploit their unwarranted privilege, even when we cannot see it. Speaking of us in unacceptable terms — sexually objectifying or not — and turning serious business into a circus, such overgrown adolescents hijack the political process, public life, and professional dealings. Before and after the legitimate meetings, made up of staged discussions of promotions and strategic plans, they retreat to their cushy buses with their own kind, speaking of us in ways that reassure them, again and again, that despite our qualifications, expertise, and performance, they are under no obligation to admit us to their club.

As he takes his stalking and sabotage public, Trump flaunts his unearned privilege, but he also reveals the imbecility and desperation of such plays for power. The only power he holds over Clinton is social: he is neither her supervisor nor her special prosecutor. He is certainly not her president. All he has is maleness. But he seems to believe himself her “star” who can do as he wishes, if not with her actual body, with the presentation of her body on stage. If this is how a man applying for the job of governing the country behaves in public, and after he has been caught out degrading women in private (again), one wonders what he, and others, might do behind closed doors when they do hold institutional power. And what women do when they are invited onto the bus cum locker room, only to find they are expected to dress up in skimpy waitress costumes and serve the cocktails, balancing the tray in one hand to give “the Bushy” a mandated hug with the other.

Workplaces seldom have an Anderson Cooper on hand to insist that coworkers answer the question of whether “grabbing pussy” constitutes sexual assault—or to interrogate a worker about whether taking credit for a female colleague’s work is theft. Nor do we have someone to insist that the looming bully hold his tongue when it is his female associate’s turn with the mic—or to ensure that our professional expertise and wisdom is accorded its proper place and monetary compensation. We do not have a Martha Raddatz to repeat the question, and repeat it again, when a bully too big for his too-often-discussed britches tries each time to wriggle out of the topic.

The moderators strove to maintain decorum. They resisted Trump’s apish antics. His dirty mouth was quieted, some, but its visual presence serves as a reminder of the way damaging words are born in the body. His lips expel offensive sounds, but that is not all: that orifice plants itself, uninvited, on women’s mouths, with only a speck of candy to cover over the bad taste. And the same mouth boasts about it later on. Perhaps that is where we need a wall.

How many of us wish for a Cooper or a Raddatz to keep things in line at work? It might be nice to have a referee who could say, “Please allow her to respond. She didn’t interrupt you.” Or, “Provide the resources and climate necessary for her to do her job. She has every right to be here.” Even better would be to be entitled to say, oneself, “Do not interfere with my right to earn a living, to engage in public life, and to serve the citizenry, including you, with my expertise. You see, you can’t do whatever you want. And, by the way, I decommissioned the goddamned bus.” But we know that all too often such self-advocacy occasions a visit from the henchman attorney general or even a harsh prison sentence. One does not want to risk being thrown under the bus for thinking oneself a person.

It’s been said that one (the only?) positive outcome of Trump’s campaign is that he has exposed the misogyny many of us knew was there all along. The gaslight burns as bright as day. Trump degrades women behind closed doors, yet Clinton is chastised for advocating a distinction between public and private “positions.” (Tellingly, one commentator changes the words around and objects to her promotion of different “personas.”) Trump boasts that he could commit murder without consequence, yet he implies that Hillary is “the devil,” literally demonizing her. He declines accountability for his objectionable behavior but holds her accountable for her husband’s actions of yore; unable to distinguish between the two partners, he even describes the rape victim whose assailant Hillary defended as a victim of Bill. His negative projections know no bounds: he gives himself permission to bring his personal biases and flaws into public life, but inverts that for her, making the professional personal by claiming that she, as a public servant, harbors hatred in her “heart.”

Enough man talk. What do we women discuss in private? Do we gloat that we can “get away with” treating our coworkers’ genitals as public property, or do we steal credit for their labor? Do we argue over which colleague is worthy of our objectification, or do we allow personal bias to control which one we award a a promotion? Do we rate their appearances on a scale of 1 to 10, or license ourselves to devalue the one whose expertise makes us feel insecure? No, we compare notes on how to get by in environments where some men do such things.

We need to locate a big, fat disgusting pig with a slobby bimbo dog face. Then we can ask this unprofessional disaster herself where her wherever is. (Full disclosure: it’s possible that she will drop to her knees to show us.)

Except . . . she doesn’t have her facts. So we might be out of luck after all. Whoever can tell us, then, where her wherever is?

Now that we have established that, let’s consider how the gleeful campaign to expel Dr. [sic] Oz from his Columbia professorship intersects with the current state of higher education.

Poppy Field Photo by Jon Bunting, via flickr

Budgets, curricula, trigger warnings, competition from the University of Wikipedia. Societal suspicion of intellection and reflection. Increasing corporatization. And let’s not forget human rights.

Professor Oz (yes, that does sound odd) is not the only academic (that too) to have his professorial status challenged of late. There are others whose livelihoods have been threatened because they hold unpopular political views or have stood up to the man. Or because they did something as distressingly ill-advised as any of us might have done under the right wrong circumstances.

So, let’s not smoke the poppies just yet.

In 2013, University of Kansas faculty member David Guth was suspended over a tweet that distastefully maligned the National Rifle Association. (Now, if he had tastefully maligned the NRA, would that have gotten a pass?) Later, National Public Radio described the Kansas Board of Regents’ introduction of guidelines for social media, which restricted what faculty could say online. On NPR, State Rep. Travis Couture-Lovelady had this to say about the incendiary tweet:

“Look, you have freedom of speech, but you can’t go this far,” he says. “I think having a clear understanding between faculty and the board of regents on what’s acceptable and what’s not is better for everyone involved.”

Couture-Lovelady, by the way, is not only a state representative but is also a member of the NRA.

“In publicly challenging the direction given to you by both the president of the university and the provost, you have demonstrated egregious conduct and insubordination and have destroyed your relationship with the senior leadership team of the university” [emphasis added].

Some leadership. Some team.

(Buckingham was later offered part of his job back, and even later, Fairbarn resigned.)

Earlier this year, Steven Salaita filed a lawsuit against the University of Illinois. In 2013, he was wooed away from a tenured position at Virginia Tech to accept a professorship, also tenured, at UI’s Urbana-Champaign campus. The following summer he was informed that his hire had been denied by the University’s Board of Trustees.

About ten months had passed since the initial offer. The previous autumn, Salaita had proposed to UIUC that he finish up the year at VT, and UIUC had agreed to defer his start date until the fall. However, the Trustees’ vote on his position did not take place until the summer, well beyond the point where he had had to sell his house in Virginia and resign his position at Virginia Tech. He was already working for UIUC, without a contract, preparing courses for the ensuing semester. Yet the discussion about l’affaire Salaitacircled around his offensive tweets. (Some faulted Salaita for accepting such conditions, even as they failed to scrutinize the management that expected him to commit, relocate, and begin working before the Trustees voted.)

Yes, I was denied tenure in retaliation for my Title IX protected speech and conduct in support of survivors of sexual assault and sexual harassment.

Theidon says that she was explicitly told not to speak up about sexual assault. Her tenure case was decided while Harvard was under investigation by the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights in regard to Title IX violations. Theidon, quoted in the Boston Globe, says she was expected to “check her conscience” when she entered campus:

“It’s about the fact that that institution would prefer to deny tenure to an eminently qualified person rather than tenure that person and have her continue to speak out about how much they have failed to protect students, both women and men, on that campus.”

(I remember reading an account—though I do not have a link handy—wherein Theidon reported being advised by an administrator that faculty do not normally undertake advocacy before attaining tenure. I wonder what sort of explanation a junior professor might offer for keeping silent about violent criminal activity for six or more years. “Sorry, can you reschedule your assault and PTSD for 2020? Maybe I’ll be able to offer support then. That is, if I get tenure . . .”)

So, back to Oz. The anti-intellectualism and even magical thinking that feed his success deserve critique, and he deserves censure. But the reactive craving for his termination, undertaken in the name of reason and science, give pause. Oz is no intellectual—at least, not in his current incarnation. However, the mass vendetta that seeks to remove him resembles, causally or not, battles against the very intellectual integrity that Oz-ousters claim to value. The content drives the public discussion, and the form is overlooked. As are the likely repercussions.

It’s not so far from cries of “Reiki faker!” to accusations of “amendment thwarter!” Or “insubordinator!” Or “Anti-Semite!” Or “man hater!”

Those who are so invested in Ozgate may consider themselves rational and intelligent and superior. They may be right. But they may also be playing with a fire they do not even know is lit. Some academic voices are touted and amplified, others merely tolerated, and still others are silenced altogether. The forces that determine these outcomes cannot be seen on TV shows.

Some praise Oz for daring to speak up against GMOs and Big Food. Others deride him for promulgating wishful thinking through homeopathy. One need not embrace a rudderless relativism to realize that the verifiability of his claims is not the sole issue at stake. (Have you never received inadequate advice, based more on personal bias than rational consideration, from a medical professional? I have.)

Imagine an intellectual you respect, one with a keen intellect, unwavering integrity, and a fierce commitment to the greater good. Imagine her fulfilling her professional obligations with expertise commitment yet being subjected to claims of inappropriate speech and insubordinate behavior. Imagine her research, lauded in the field at large, suddenly subjected to disproportionate scrutiny and found lacking by the administration that had previously tenured her. Imagine her being directed not to speak in public—whatever “public” means these days—about any misgivings she may have about her university’s policies. Imagine her receiving word that she should not, at 11 p.m. of an evening, on the comfort of her sofa, compose an impassioned, impolitic few sentences expressing frustration at gun violence. Imagine her being told she is not to speak up in support of students who have reported being raped.

That’s why we have tenure. Or had it.

A little Reiki and unfounded weight-loss advice might not be such an insupportable price to pay for academic freedom. And who’s so sure we can’t converse with the departed anyway?

The women whom I love and admire for their strength and grace did not get that way because shit worked out. They got that way because shit went wrong, and they handled it. They handled it in a thousand different ways on a thousand different days, but they handled it. Those women are my superheroes.

—Elizabeth Gilbert (Facebook Post, March 26, 2015)

Women are not required to suffer and “handle it” for me to admire them. They do not need to be superheroes. They do not need to do anything to serve me.

We all suffer and manage as we can—or not. If one is going to invoke the greatness of “handling it” when “s*** happens,” it might be useful to distinguish between the inconvenience of waiting for the bus in the rain or finding that one’s favorite restaurant is out of squid pasta and the outrage of being undervalued, overlooked, underpaid, harassed, threatened, stalked, abused, beaten, raped, or killed—all of which happen to women every day simply because they are women. Idealizing “superheroes” who “handle it,” without elaboration, risks giving the impression that one approves of those things, that one is content with inequity, exploitation, even atrocity.

Replace “women” with “men,” and see how that sounds.

By admiring “s*** handling,” one disregards the matter of injustice—and we are not obliged to “handle” that either. Not on our own.

Sure, rhapsodize about the gifts of suffering—there are many—but rhapsodize over one’s own, not someone else’s.

There is a tired old myth still circulating out there about women—a myth that says that we must be rescued, that we are fragile and helpless, that without external validation we collapse, and that disappointment and heartbreak and loss will destroy us.

—Elizabeth Gilbert (Facebook Post, March 26, 2015)

Another tired myth is that it is noble for us to withstand, to endure, without any expectation of relief or release.

If a woman loses her nerve, falls short of her goals, crumples in despair, or takes her own life, she is not failing to serve her purpose as my “superhero.” She does not have to “handle it” for my sake. She has the right be destroyed when destruction finds her.

Women (and others) who romanticize women’s suffering and endurance in the face of adversity—or outright injustice—have my compassion but not my admiration.

No matter; their value is not dependent on my admiration. My opinion is irrelevant.

Rather than illuminate her dark women, Paglia turns the light on her true subject: herself. She offers reductive comment after reductive comment, promoting herself and smearing the intellectual community, while claiming other scholars are reducing art to ideology. Did no one advise her to cite sources? Who is it who claims that “a few laws and sexual harassment committees will make it all [misogyny] go away?” Is she unable to distinguish between opinion and idea, between attitude and inquiry? And how is it that with all her time on the stage she cannot deliver a single sentence without “uh, ok, you know” and a parade of em dashes?

Paglia claims, “Academics on the whole have absolutely no idea about how art is made or how the artistic mind works. This is one of the main reasons for the utter incompetence and sterility of so much academic criticism about the arts.” Apparently, all scholars, except Paglia, lack any understanding whatsoever of vision, ecstasy and peak moments: “All of that is completely gone from any kind of discourse on the arts. What passes for criticism of the arts in the academy is absolutely,—ok—it’s useless, and it has driven away several generations of young people from the arts.” Well, there are plenty of young people in my arts community, at my university, in my courses and private lessons. They are mentored by devoted, probing scholars and artists who refrain from—fasten your seat belts—reductively reducing all other scholars to ideologues who see nothing but ideology in art.

Paglia claims that “art is deeply interconnected with the dream process.” Indeed, her fictional account of a uniformly bumbling, incompetent, unimaginative academic community is quite a dream. (Bumbling comes easily, but one of the many things we academics are not good at is consistency and unity. [Oh, that’s two things. See what I mean?])

Perhaps Paglia would like to read Brandon LaBelle’s commentary on the dream nature of Hildegard Westerkamp’s sound art; or Daniel Albright on the “inhumanly intense orgasm” in Yeats’s pseudo-Noh plays; or Malcolm Turvey’s account of the “machine aesthetic” in Ballet Mécanique. I’m sure she could find a full reading list if she were to give a moment’s notice to the scholars she terms “incompetent” and “provincial.” There are many subtle and invigorating critical writings to be found. Or are listening and nuance also “useless” to Paglia?

And what about those of us who are both creative artists and scholars? Does Paglia understand art-making better than those of us who . . . um, ok . . . practice it? And who sometimes collaborate with full-time scholars to consider exactly the phenomena she insists are “completely gone” from the sterile work of us blunderers who have “absolutely no idea about how art is made or how the artistic mind works”? I guess, when I step out of my studio and into class, the composer region of my mind goes to sleep and I am suddenly seized by the delusion that all artists are “political sign wavers” in order to “drive away several generations of young people from the arts.” No wonder I have been so tired lately.

It is telling that Paglia casts ad hominem aspersions rather than exploring the ideas and insights of these unnamed scholars. We hear about “the people who are teaching in humanities departments,” accompanied by crude, unattributed caricatures. I would rather focus on Paglia’s inquiries rather than her infantile persona, but it is difficult to do so when she herself cannot get past the players to see the play. Paglia energetically describes herself as “persona non grata in academia”: apparently that self-description gives her street cred. At a time when universities are becoming more and more corporatized; when academic freedom and intellectual inquiry face extinction; and when most higher-education instructors are overextended, under-compensated adjuncts with little time available to misunderstand art in the way Paglia condemns,—and when dozens of universities have been investigated for Title IX violations for mishandling sexual assaults—it is not only sensationalistic, not only irresponsible, but abhorrent to flog the entire scholarly community for imagined sins. Who is it, again, who is driving young people away?

Has Paglia based her own ideology on scholarship about bondage? Has she noticed that we did not agree to her terms? And does she know that that makes her words an assault? Or does her insistence that revulsion is part of our “dream life” extend to fantasies of whipping her comrades, enacted through words? What about the “dream life” that depicts students overpowered and violated by their peers in their own dorm rooms?

Few women are accorded a stage where they can construct themselves as rebels and iconoclasts, where they can believe their own hype. Such honors usually go to the Steven Pinkers and . . . those other guys. One does not want to come down harder on Paglia than on the unbuttoned noblemen who—you might want to sit down for this—trade on their institutional privilege to pretend to puncture the very establishment that provides the pulpit from which to do so. But why Paglia? Is it because she proffers shallow, vacuous, easily digestible propaganda, bullying the tenants of the university rather than scrutinizing the master’s house? Does her hemming and hawing invite the spectator to look down on her inarticulate bluster even as he makes an ostentatious display of cheering her wild transgressions? Does the anti-intellectual state maintain order by “allowing” her to play the maverick, as long as her performance does not threaten the royals who continue to exclude true iconoclasts and risk-takers from the banquet? (A meal laid out on a table being dismantled even as she critiques the entrée.)

Now that would be reductive. And ideological. And useless. To some of us, at least.

1. Remember that they may not know what you would like from them, especially if they have not yet had the pleasure of meeting you. (Most people cannot read minds, and if you can’t do so, you will not know who can. Of course, if you can, you’ll recognize each other, and all will be well.)

2. Remember that if someone says something you dislike, abusive language is not the best way to respond. Calling someone an “asshat” does not fall under the tone argument provision.

3. Remember that projection is also a boundary violation. Especially because you are bossy and intolerant.

4. Remember that attributing nonexistent statements or thoughts to others is also a boundary violation; and yes, I know you think semicolons are pretentious.

5. Avoid presuming to tell the other person what to do. Take a breath and lighten up. Be kind.

6. Remember that not everyone has the privilege of being able to learn about complex social interactions; not everyone has the resources to do so to your liking; and some have limitations that make this difficult. And remember that these people just may know something you do not; you would not want them to start correcting your grammar, would you? (I have not forgotten that you think semicolons are pretentious, you intolerant asshat. Clearly you think I am stupid, and clearly you are intolerant of stupid people. Lighten up, breathe and be kind.)

7. Take your own inventory: Ask yourself whether you have ever interacted with someone in a way that they disliked. No? Good. Then remember to engage in projection, aggression, escalation, and insult. When the superior ones among us do it, it has an entirely beneficial effect.

“Girls are fully nurtured by society in their journey to adulthood. Girls understand that when they show leadership, integrity, and self-respect, they are honored as total motherfuckers.”—Not quite George McEncroe

“As we head in opposite directions, he politely inclines his head toward me, leaving a respectful space between us, and congenially says, ‘Top of the mornin’, fellow motherfucker.’ Humbly, asking nothing in return, he keeps walking, and I stop dead in the middle of the street, hoping someone else just saw two motherfuckers meet in delight.”
—Not quite Emily Heist Moss

Consumer choices define the especially iconoclastic figure known as the “Marvs Mofo”: she supports the economy by patronizing Trader Joe’s, Michael Kors, and Starbucks. There is a complex daily ritual of exercise, support of the arts, self-nourishment, and spiritual practice. First comes yoga class, making sure to hydrate with tequila (brand of choice) while listening to Ariana Grande (a cult figure, no doubt). Grounded and energized for the day, our Marvs Mofo changes into elegant jean shorts and moves on to eat artisanal flatbread while sampling craft beer. This is followed by a dessert of locally sourced organic froyo and a peaty, imported single malt. Then comes a late-night trip to Chipotle—and, in the morning, brunch. Due to the highly secretive and selective nature of the Marvs Mofo sisterhood, is not yet known whether the typical—not that there could be such a thing!—Marvs Mofo cultivates friendships, makes a living, or attends church. Howevs, appaz she considers the esoteric, underground art practice known as Instagram totes crazy!
—Not quite Kara McGrath

“No one would expect a motherfucker to quell her ambitions for the sake of others’ pettiness and envy. That would be like asking her to gobble up dung with an incongruous smile, and why would anyone want her to do that? It’s be as if she were pretending to be small so that others could feel bigger. What a fucked-up idea.”
—Not quite Jessica Valenti

I’m a member of a Facebook group about language usage. A fellow member started a thread asking whether it was OK to use the word “freshman”, and if not, what alternatives exist. Just to be clear, the issue at hand is whether the “man” in “freshman” excludes women students.

There was some good discussion. I noted that I’ve recently heard many women students use the term “freshman” for other women students. Others wrote that terms like “first year” or “frosh” were favored in the schools they know.

And of course, there were the regular lot of men (only men) complaining about having to be “PC”. In their mouths, “politically correct” is an insult. For me, it means being inclusive, sensitive to others’ feelings and history, being gracious to others. For such traditional guys, it might even be described as simply being a gentleman.